Al Golden press conference transcript heading into the Boston College game
Notre Dame practiced outside late Tuesday afternoon with temperatures in the 30s and light snow falling. Afterwards, Irish defensive coordinator Al Golden met with the media to discuss 18th-ranked ND's upcoming game with Boston College, Saturday at Notre Dame Stadium (2:30 p.m. EST; NBC).
Q: How will you deal with having to prepare for two quarterbacks? (Note: Starting QB Phil Jurkovec hasn’t practiced or played since suffering multiple injuries in a loss to UConn on Oct. 29. He attended Tuesday’s practice in street clothes.)
Golden: “They both have characteristics that (offensive coordinator) John (McNulty) will try to accentuate with each one in terms of how they play the game. So, we’ll get ready for either one. There’s enough (tape) on both of them to obviously have an idea of what they do well and how they want to conduct the game when they're in there. So, obviously, they're playing with a lot of confidence right now. Either one is a challenge, and we’ve got to be ready either way.”
Q: What does Emmett Morehead do best?
Golden: “Well, I think he's playing with a lot of confidence right now. He's got a big arm. He can escape and reset his feet to get the ball down the field. Good vision. Again, he'll stay with the read. He's not going to just panic on it. But I think he's doing a really good job for them. So, again, we expect to see both either way.”
Q: What's your relationship with John McNulty?
Golden: “John and I were teammates at Penn State, so we’ve stayed in touch for a long time now. I'm really excited for the opportunity that he and his family (has at BC). Great guy.”
Q: Practice outside today?
Golden: “Yeah, we did. Yeah, it was good. We got a lot done. No hangover today from the Navy (game), which is always hard on defense to transition back to your normal defense. So, I thought the kids and the coaches did an unbelievable job of just transitioning back into it. A lot of guys came in yesterday and got the game plan early, and all that really helped them to transition. I thought it was a smooth transition. We're not where we need to be. We'll get there by Thursday, Friday, but just really, really great energy to get what we needed to get done today.”
Q: From Navy, what's just a throwaway or one off (from the game), and what are things you can take away from that, that actually do apply?
Golden: “Everything that we’ll take away is probably fundamentals —tackling in the alley, ball disruption, those types of things. Everything else goes in the vault, and we'll pull it out in February after recruiting and get ready for Navy, in Dublin. Other than that, we transitioned really quick as a staff. We moved forward almost immediately Sunday morning. You’ve got to. You’ve got to, because it doesn't really apply. It doesn't pay forward.”
Q: BC is very intent on getting Zay Flowers as many touches as possible. How creative are they with it? Where do they do a good job with it? And then what kind of player is Flowers?
Golden: “I think he's an awesome player. I really do. I think he's excellent. He's in that league with (Josh) Downs and (Jaxon Smith-)Njigba. I mean, he's in that group, so I have a ton of respect for him. Kid makes plays all over the field, down the field and make plays with the ball in his hands. Obviously, the targets for him were up recently. So yeah, he's a challenge. He's a challenge vertically. He's a challenge underneath, and he's got the hands to make you pay. So, we just got to make sure that we know where he is and we're aware of what he's doing.”
Q: What, if anything, is transferable from Xavier Watts’ performance on Saturday?
Golden: “Well, again, here's what is transferable: He tracked really well in the alley. His technique in his tackling was very, very good. His block destruction was good. His crack replace was good. Those are all elements that once you own those fundamentals, you should be able to carry them forward. Again, none of these guys just get to that point where they're the player of the game (suddenly). I mean, he worked really, really hard over a long period of time and gradually made gains. So, we were fortunate that he ended up having that kind of game last week.”
Q: What's maybe the next step for him?
Golden: “Just continue to lead. If you're playing safety, you’ve got to be a leader. You have to have great communication skills and you have to run the defense. So, at the end of the day, you have to run the back end and be decisive. We can correct decisions. We can't correct indecisiveness. We can’t correct that, so just trying to get him to have more confidence in terms of that. And last week was a big step for that.”
Q: This was really the first time we saw Junior Tuihalamaka play linebacker as opposed to up on the line?
Golden: “I'm excited about Junior. I just think he's a versatile guy who can play on or off (the line), and that will probably be his MO for quite some time. He’s a big guy. He's smart. Again, it's hard to make your debut against that outfit, but I'm proud of him, the way he battled and everything. There are some things we’ve got to clean up, but certainly, just glad to see him out there. It's great.”
Q: Along those lines, Prince Kollie sets a career high in snaps against a team that's kind of hard to defend.
Golden: “No doubt. Same thing, just it is a challenge. And I think the thing about PK and Marist (Liufau) that jumped out to me was they got better as the game went on. So, as the game unfolded, they saw the runs a little bit better. The speed of it was challenging. Now the fullback got on us early in the game, and those guys ended up responding to those same plays later on in the game. So, I was proud of that.”
Q: I know they're not the same player, but it seemed like Jack Kiser kind of made up for what you might have been missing with JD Bertrand out?
Golden: “Jack played really well. He was right there in terms of (defensive) player the game, and I think he ended up getting a special teams player of the game. He was locked in all week. He played really well for us. I don't know how many tackles he ended up with — I think the same as X. (He had eight.) So he had eight tackles, but he was playing a little different position for us. He was playing outside in the game. And I thought he did a really good job.”
Q: Coach Freeman has talked a lot about being humble and always being willing to learn. But what have you seen that’s helped (the defense) navigate some of the early missteps?
Golden: “Stay humble. Just be consistent. You know, it’s how you respond on a daily basis — to the weather, to success, to hardship, to injury or whatever the case may be. Just become so callous in your consistent approach that you're the same guy every day. You're the same routine every day, and those ebbs and flows aren't as drastic.
“That’s what we're trying to do. We're trying to reduce those oscillations, if you will. Reduce the valleys and obviously just keep moving forward. And that's the biggest thing is just keep moving forward and not really getting to the point where you're really dipping down. I think that's been our focus.”
Q: Do you think Marcus Freeman has been able to do that with his approach?
Golden: “He's been unbelievable, just really consistent the whole season. You know, the same guy every day. The approach with the players has been awesome. I think the players respect that. I think they respect his consistency, his appreciation, and his gratitude toward them. And the fact that he's in the foxhole with them, I think they respect that a lot. That's going to be the big thing, down here, down the stretch. Just one practice. Just don't worry about anything else, but this one practice. And learn from it on the film and get better tomorrow and have another good practice.”
Q: You got nine reps from Jaylen Sneed on Saturday. What kind of impression did he make?
Golden: “He is what we thought he would be. I mean, he's getting there in terms of understanding and learning the defense and playing faster. But in terms of his raw ability, you could see it on the film. You could see it on the tape when you watch it. So, his ability to beat blocks, be disruptive, stay on his feet. All those things and his length. His length shows up when he's trying to disengage. So, all those were really, really big positive steps. The biggest positive step was his approach to practice every day, his approach to the game. It gave us confidence, and he's got to continue to do that, because we can play him as much as he wants to play right now.”
Q: Any of the freshmen on defense that haven't played that you'd like to get a peek at in a game?
Golden: “It’s a good question. We're not really there yet, because we're in pretty good shape on the D-line. We're five inside guys, five outside guys right now. So maybe we would need somebody if someone got dinged, but right now we're pretty healthy there. Linebacker has been the issue in terms of the health, so I don't know if that's going to happen. If it does, they'll be ready.”
Q: Is there value to getting somebody like Nolan Zeigler or Joshua Burnham or Tyson Ford a few snaps in a game if the score would dictate that?
Golden: “I'm not going there with the score. I run scared (smiles). Every game I approach the same way. Every single game I approached the same way. It doesn't matter. I’ve got my two-minute calls. I got my four-minute calls. I don't know how it's going to turn out. My job is to get ready, and we'll react to anything if it comes up. But in terms of all that, we're just trying to win a game and trying to get good today.”
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